


Long Sleeves

by unknowableroom_archivist



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-11-19
Updated: 2005-11-19
Packaged: 2019-01-19 22:35:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,776
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12419688
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unknowableroom_archivist/pseuds/unknowableroom_archivist
Summary: Draco Malfoy always wore long sleeves. Whether it was to hide his sin from himself or from her, Hermione never knew.





	Long Sleeves

**Author's Note:**

> Note from ChristyCorr, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Unknowable Room](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Unknowable_Room), a Harry Potter archive active from 2005-2016. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project after May 2017. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Unknowable Room collection profile](http://www.archiveofourown.org/collections/unknowableroom).

Draco Malfoy always wore long sleeves.

She knew this and Harry always tried to use it as proof that he was a Death Eater. The reason he was wearing long sleeves was so he could hide the Dark Mark. Hermione heard his accusations, but she always tried to keep them out of her mind. But Harry was persistent and the fact remained: it was the middle of May and Draco Malfoy was wearing long sleeves.

Hermione felt that she couldn't have Draco be a Death Eater. Somehow, that would completely erode her life. She had built her life up on routines and sterotypes. Draco Malfoy was the Pureblood Prat. He was annoying yes, but murderous? Never. Would she slap him and hate his arrogance? Without a doubt. Would she be ready to face him on the field of battle and kill him without a worry? She didn't think that she could. If he was a Death Eater, then all the fabric of her life would slowly unravel until even the bonds that held her, Harry, and Ron together would fray beyond repair. 

It was all really just a game that they played, it was all really like Quidditch. She wonders if that's why she's always hated Quidditch, because she sees the larger games reflected in a simple game played on broomsticks. Good vs. Evil. Harry Potter vs. Voldemort. Dumbledore vs. the Ministry of Magic. Gryffindor vs. Slytherin. Pureblood vs. Malfoy. Malfoy vs. Granger. It's all just a game. She just wonders when the stakes became so high. 

Harry won't talk about what happened at the tower, but the results are the same: Dumbledore is dead, Malfoy and Snape are gone, probably to the Death Eaters, and her life has crumpled. Harry was right. The long sleeves never lied. Draco Malfoy was a Death Eater, and now she's completley lost, watching her life fall around her. How long before she finds out that she was wrong about Harry or Ron?

She doesn't go home with the others. She sees Harry and Ron go away, their heads bent close together in talk. She Ginny walk past her, her eyes wide and vacant. They are both girls looking for their salvation. Perhaps they'll find it. But for now Hermione needs to stay at Hogwarts. Somehow she senses that it's going to be the last time she's ever here as a student and she wants to relish the feeling. Here was where she had her first triumphs, here was where she first belonged. Here was where she first really cried.

It comes back to Malfoy, it always does. She sees the Quidditch pitch, where he first called her a Mudblood. She sees the area outside of Hagrid's hut where she slapped him. She wonders where Hagrid's going to live now. And her feet eventually draw her to the tower. The grass at the feet of the tower has turned brown and crispy and she doesn't know if it'll always be like that. She thinks that it would be an insult if the grass did go back to being green and lush after something like Dumbledore's body has been lying on it. 

"I would've thought that you were going home with Potty and the Weasel." Hermione turns around, not at all surprised by the slow drawl. She sees him leaning against the tree, his angelic Elfin face marred by that sneer he's always wearing. Hermione looks and she sees her suspicions confirmed. Even now, in the heat of the summer, when she herself is wearing short sleeves, even after everything that's happened, Draco Malfoy is still wearing long sleeves.

"I would've thought that you would be with Voldemort," she returned. She tries to find hate in her heart, she tries to find the anger enough to curse Malfoy. But she can't find it within herself. She knows that Harry could, and she thinks that Ron could as well. Perhaps she's just weaker than they are. Or perhaps she's strong enough to try to look past her enemy. 

"Don't dare his name you Mudblood," he hisses at her, standing up straight as she walks towards him. Her steps are slow and unfaltering until she's standing right in front of him. She looks into his cold grey eyes and tries to see what makes a man turn away from love and go instead to hate and death.

She sees the answer reflected back to her, and in truth it's been there whenever he talks about his family. The Malfoys are tied together by their own brand of love and pride. When other children were wanting to be star Quidditch players or caretakers of dragons, Draco Malfoy dreamed of being a Death Eater, just like his father. When Hermione thinks about it like that, she finds it easier to pity him. But she also knows that pity is the last thing that Malfoy wants. But she thinks that there might be a reason why, even after he said that he was a Death Eater he might still want to hide it behind long sleeves.

"Roll up your sleeves," she says softly, reaching out for his left wrist. Malfoy draws back like he's been wounded and glares at her. 

"Get away from me you Mudblood," he hisses at her, disappearing into the forest before she can say anything else. Hermione sits and stares after him. He has lost the ability to hurt her with his words. 

She doesn't know why she goes back the next day, but she does and he does as well. Their silence is almost deafening, but there are no words they could say. The barrier of blood stands between them. Despite the silence they both come back day after day, to sit there, stare at where Malfoy sinned, and try to hate each other. 

She thinks that it was natural, their first kiss. Who else couldn't have seen it coming? It was not passionate, but it was powerful, the way that Malfoy grabbed her biceps and pulled her flush against him. His lips found hers and they pressed against each other, passing flames and something deeper through each other. 

It's just an extension of the game, their tongues battling for victory now. Who will win? No one knows. And even when his hands slide beneath her shirt to touch her skin, to play with her bra, he still keeps his long sleeves on. There's something there that Draco doesn't want to admit even to himself. 

Harry and Ron are getting ready to go on their journey to find the Horcruxes. Hermione knows it's wrong, meeting with a Death Eater every single day, especially at the place where Harry's mentor died, but she can't stop herself. Draco needs to be saved, and she's the person that's been chosen to do it. 

She remembers perfectly the first night that they made love. It was the first night that they met somewhere other than the tower. She looked out of her window on an impulse and she saw him outside on the street, glowing even without the Muggle streetlights. She went outside and led him to her bedroom and started kissing him. There might have been words, but she couldn't remember them. They must not have been important. 

And now she's sitting on the bed, half-naked, with her hands on Draco's wrists. He's wearing long sleeves again. 

"Please," she begs, unbuttoning the wrist buttons. "Please Draco." He lets her undo the buttons on his wrist and roll them up. And she sees it on his left wrist, glaring up at her, its livid black mocking everything that she stands for. She runs her fingers over the tattoo and Draco winces. Whether it's from her seeing his curse, the pain that she causes him touching it, or whether he doesn't want her touching something so evil, she doesn't know. His shirt is pulled off and Hermione cries over his Dark Mark, her tears attempting to wash away the filth from his arm. 

"I love you," she gasps later that night, when Draco pulls out of her. He lies down next to her and doesn't say anything, but Hermione understands. He never slips. She sees the words hover around his perfect lips during their passion, during their climax, but they never fall to her waiting ears. But that's all right. She doesn't need to hear the words. She can see them.

It comes around to Malfoy, it always does. Now it's the final battle and Hermione is standing next to Harry and Ron, just like she always knew she would. Malfoy is standing next to his father, a cut on his cheek causing one side of his pale face to turn crimson. Those grey eyes are turned to her and his wand is held out to her, pointing straight at her chest. His lips are turned up in a smirk, and Hermione suddenly knows he's not going to curse her. But Ron doesn't know that.

"Don't you dare hurt Hermione you bastard!" Ron screams, his former laughing face gone, replaced by some demon of rage and grief. And why shouldn't it be? He has had to watch his family die in front of him. He will not watch the girl that he loves die. "Avada Kedavra!" Ron screams. Hermione's mouth opens in a silent scream of horror as she sees the green light burst out of the end of Ron's wand and hit Malfoy straight in the chest. Their eyes lock and she sees the words written on his Elfin face and in his eyes. <i>I love you.</i>His body hangs in suspended motion, before falling to the ground with a thud of finality, of death, of the end. The game was finally over. Hermione was the victor, but only for a moment.

If Malfoy was alive, perhaps she wouldn't have been concentrating on him so much. Maybe she would have seen his father take revenge for his dead son that he knew nothing about. She might have heard Lucius scream the Killing Curse, she would've even heard Ron's scream of anguish as her eyes dulled in death and she fell to the ground. 

But words have never been important to her. It has always been the sights that she's concentrated on. And she is looking at the most important thing in the world right now. Even when his mask was ripped off, even when the entire world knew that Draco Malfoy was a Death Eater, he was still trying to hide the sin and the damnation from himself and from the woman he loved. 

When he died, Draco Malfoy was wearing long sleeves.


End file.
